Smokehouse Redux

This year, our homely old smokehouse got a facelift.  I hired Mike to "purty it up" by covering it with clapboard and making it more useable as a storage building/potting shed/woodshed. Now, not only does it function better, but it has improved the view from my kitchen window tremendously!

P.S.  The clapboard was salvaged from a 100+ year old farmhouse in Bristol.  Turned to the unpainted side and planed down, it is as good as new.

BEFORE:

IN PROGRESS:

AFTER:

Pinatas, Horses, and Mary Poppins Medleys: Time with Family

What is summer without adventures with extended family?  Here are some photographs from our favorite family frolics this year.

COUSIN RAE'S BIRTHDAY PARTY

Rae as a parrot

Thomas making a "deal" with cousin Carstyn for candy

Posing with Wendy Wiggles (dog)

RIDING HORSES WITH AUNT KIM AND COUSIN OLIVIA

OUTDOOR SYMPHONY CONCERT

With Aunt Betty and Uncle "Shoe"

Goofing off with Mamaw

(excited about the Mary Poppins medley that was a special request from Thomas)

Riding in the wagon with Cousin Skylar

Forsaking All Heirlooms: Tomato Harvest 2014

Having spent the last ten years remaining faithful to heirloom tomatoes, which oftentimes succumbed to disease before harvest, I decided to grow all hybrids this year.  I hated to join the "Dark Side," but I simply did not want to spend hours fighting blight and wilt and blossom-end rot only to come up mushy, diseased fruit.  You can see that perhaps it was a wise decision as we were overloaded with healthy, red tomatoes that were consumed immediately or put in jars for enjoyment this winter.  What will next year bring?  Well, maybe I'll try to grow ONE Brandywine.

A Day at the Beach

This summer, Thomas and I picked up Lance at Camp LeJeune, after he had put in two weeks with the Marines.  We took the opportunity to do a little shore-line vacationing while we were there, visiting Cape Lookout lighthouse, Wilmington, and Carolina Beach.

On the USS Carolina Battleship

Adjusting the trunks

Feeling the waves...

...and the sand underneath

A beautiful shell!

"Hey, this would make a great drawbridge!"

Installing the drawbridge 

Instructing Daddy on the best way to build a moat 

The finished castle!

And a favorite poem by e.e. cummings:

maggie and milly and molly and may

went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang

 so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles, and

milly befriended a stranded star

whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing

which raced sideways while blowing bubbles; and

may came home with a smooth round stone

as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)

it's always ourselves we find in the sea

24,746 + Russell

Another obligatory stop when we visit Granddad is Shiloh battlefield.  Here, I have some of my earliest memories of getting excited about history.  Last April, we attended the commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the battle.  Before nightfall, rangers and volunteers had lit a candle for every casualty of the battle--24, 746 total.  These candles, protected by paper bags, lined the roads meandering through the battlefield.  It took us nearly two hours to complete the tour in the car, all the while listening to the soundtrack to the Ken Burns Civil War documentary.  At first, I didn't know what to expect from the commemoration--I guessed it would be loud and tacky with "Dixie" playing in the background (even though the South lost the battle.)  It was nothing like that.  Instead a candle for every casualty--simple, quiet, and powerful.  It was perfect.

But there should have been one more candle--one for Russell, Thomas's stuffed green frog that was lost when we were traipsing about the battlefield earlier in the day.  To look for our lost friend, we searched in all the places we had been: "The Hornet's Nest," "The Peach Orchard," "Grant's Last Line"--but poor Russell remained Missing in Action.  

This year, we of course went back to the battlefield to look for Russell again.  But alas, he was no where to be found.  I told Thomas that he was either taken prisoner or he hopped off to "Bloody Pond" to live out the rest of his life.  And as with so many Civil War soldiers, there exists no photograph of Russell.

Mamaw and Thomas looking for Russell at the "Hornet's Nest"

Could Russell have hidden in a cannon?

Looking for Russell at "Bloody Pond"

Re-enactors firing a cannon.  Watch out, Russell!

Visit to Stoney Lonesome

Over the 4th of July weekend, Mamaw, Poppy, Thomas and I went to see Granddad (Poppy's father) in west TN.  At 97, Granddad--R.A. Phillips-- is still farming the hundred+ acre farm called "Stoney Lonesome," which came to him through his wife, Willie Ruth, or as we called her, "Memom."  The farm name came from a letter written by a Union soldier who was camping near a spring on the property before the battle of Shiloh; in the letter, the soldier describes the place as "stoney" and "lonesome."  Trips to Stoney Lonesome were among the most anticipated events of my childhood.  Memom and I would look for butterflies, Granddad and I would go to the bank, Shane and I would explore the creek, and the whole family would pile into the car and go the Catfish Hotel.  Now, Thomas can tag along and make memories too.

At the Catfish Hotel

Visiting Memom's grave

You can't see it, but there is a tiger swallowtail in this picture.  No doubt it is Memom, who taught science and dearly loved butterflies, following us to the creek. "It's snakey down there," she is probably trying to tell us.

Looking for "Ollie's Paw Rock" in the creek.  To explain:  Last year, we found a rock in Granddad's creek that looked like it had a cat paw imprinted in it.  We called it "Ollie's Paw Rock."  It has since disappeared, so we decided to look for a new one.  Though none quite as feline-pawish as that one, we did find some interesting candidates, including some with fossils!

Playing Chinese Checkers with Poppy.  

(Chinese Checker games were legendary at Memom and Granddad's.  Memom was a formidable opponent.  In fact, even after she was suffering from severe dementia, she was still winning games of Chinese Checkers!)

Creek Fun

The annual Gilreath family reunion is held every year at Laurel Run Park, a shady little spot with swings, slides...and a creek.  This year, Thomas took his boat to float in the tunnels.  Here are some pictures of aquatic adventure.

The release.

It made it through...

...and so did Thomas!

On the other side...can you find the boat?

Thomas and Papaw with the boat.

Corn Face

The first fresh corn of the summer is always a special treat, and with the rain we've had this year, the corn crop has been bountiful.  Here are some pictures of Thomas enjoying an ear of"Merit" corn from Poppy's garden. 

The Great Dirt Blender

One of my goals this year was to line the brick pathways at the farm with herbs.  As usual, I employed my two favorite assistants--Mamaw and Thomas--to help get the job done.  It was Thomas's job to put a shovel-ful of compost in each hole and mix it with the existing dirt.  He quickly developed his own unique style by spinning the shovel in his hands and making it work like a blender.  We were all quite proud of his innovation.